This invention concerns a bending-shaping machine having multiple working levels.
The bending-shaping machine of this invention is applied properly to the field of processing sections for reinforced concrete, whether those sections are obtained from straight bars or wound rolls and whether the sections have a round, square, polygonal or other cross section.
The bending-shaping machine to which the invention is applied has a vertical or almost vertical or, in any event, inclined working surface, and the working surface can often be oriented from the horizontal to the vertical.
To be more exact, the bending-shaping machine according to the invention performs the bending of steel bars for building work and is especially suitable to bend long steel bars or complex stirrups.
Considerable difficulties are encountered in bending complex stirrups and steel bars of a great length with bending-shaping machines.
In fact with the bending-shaping machines of the state of the art it is impossible to bend the trailing end of complex stirrups without these complex stirrups coming into contact during processing with the shearing unit or with the drawing and/or straightening assembly located upstream of the bending unit.
In the same way it is impossible to make certain bends in the trailing ends of long steel bars since the bars come into contact with the shearing unit or with the drawing and/or straightening assembly located upstream of the bending unit of the bending-shaping machine.
This fact restricts the production capacity of the bending-shaping machines of the state of the art considerably.
IT 15904 A/89 discloses a bending-shaping machine with a shearing unit which can be retracted below the working surface, so that bends can also be made in complex stirrups and long steel bars. This movement of retraction of the shearing unit can be achieved with complex mechanisms which require burdensome maintenance work and difficulties in installation and setting-up and relatively long cycle times.
IT 83543 A/90 discloses a bending-shaping machine which is the basis of this invention. This bending-shaping machine entails the drawback that the bends in the trailing ends of sections have to have a modest length. The present applicants have designed, tested and embodied this invention to obviate the shortcomings of the state of the art and to achieve further advantages.